


We're Stronger Together

by Akiko_Natsuko



Series: Stingue [13]
Category: Fairy Tail
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, Friendship/Love, Kisses, M/M, Promises
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-06
Updated: 2020-04-06
Packaged: 2021-03-01 17:35:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23500939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Akiko_Natsuko/pseuds/Akiko_Natsuko
Summary: Sting and Rogue had always been each other’s first and everything, and that was true of their first kiss all those years ago and all the kisses, and promises sealed with them that followed.
Relationships: Rogue Cheney/Sting Eucliffe
Series: Stingue [13]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1188727
Comments: 4
Kudos: 33
Collections: Shadowlight Week 2020





	We're Stronger Together

**Author's Note:**

> Please note that if you want to talk to me about my fics and writing, or anime/shows/games in general then you can now find me on discord [The Unholy Trinity](https://discord.gg/6sSddAWa5c).

_Sting and Rogue had always been each other’s first and everything, and that was true of their first kiss all those years ago. A stolen press of the lips, done on a dare no less. They’d always been together, inseparable years before they were known as the Twin Dragons, and the other Dragon-slayers had noticed, and dared them to kiss, expecting them to refuse. They’d both been shy and red-faced, but neither had hesitated, why would they? It was the two of them, and even when the other kids laughed and tried to whistle as they’d seen adults do, they had smiled at each other, knowing that it was the ‘first’ but not realising just what that would come to mean._

****

Neither of them remembered that ‘first’ kiss, the memory of it lost through time and trauma, but they remained together. Sting and Rogue. Rogue and Sting. They grew, they learned and trained, and lost. Bound together by more than friendship, more than the warmth of something more that grew between them over the years, as they held each other in the wake of Weisslogia and Skiadrum’s deaths at their hands.

Friends. Partners…More.

It was unspoken between that they were ‘more’, they both knew it and embraced it. Not caring when their devotion to the other raised eyebrows and drew comments, curling together at night, protective of the other in a way that they weren’t of anyone but their feline companions. Even when pressed, which happened more often than they could count, they wouldn’t put a name to it. Wouldn’t say anything other than ‘he’d mine, and I’m his’ and so the years had passed.

They might have remained like that, drifting in that nebulous place between friends and more, were it not for Sabertooth. It had been a unanimous decision for them to join Sabertooth, chasing strength and power, and that distant, elusive dream, rooted in a mostly forgotten past, and the stories of the other Dragon-slayers they heard. Years later, they would still stand by that choice for all that it had cost them, or nearly cost them, because it had pushed them together. Embracing the ‘more’ as they learned that the only one, they could rely on in their guild was each other.

Looking back, neither of them would be able to say what had happened to set Jiemma off that day, not that it would have taken much. They had still been learning that strength and power was the only thing that mattered in that guild, that the slightest weakness could bring their Master’s wrath down on their heads, even if they were still learning and growing. Already they had proved themselves to be on the same level or above some of the existing strongest members, especially together, their teamwork and ability – newly found- to combine their magic setting them apart, but it hadn’t been enough. Some slight, some slip, had draw Jiemma’s wrath down on Sting’s head. Washing over him like a tsunami of rage, and spite, until Rogue had stepped forward, shaking as he had spoken out, a hint of a snarl in his words as he tried to redirect the man’s wrath from the other Dragon-slayer.

The subsequent punishment had been enough to send Rogue to the infirmary, a fuming, but subdued Sting and two sniffling Exceeds in their wake. No one had spoken in their defence, no one had offered to help Rogue upstairs.

It was the four of them, the two of them.

Friends.

Partners.

More.

Sting had been silent as he’d patched Rogue up, both of them having far too much experience at this by this point, and through it all Rogue watched him, quiet and waiting. Braced for the scolding that would come, knowing that his defiance had made things worse, even if he had succeeded in drawing attention away from Sting. It was a well-rehearsed process by this point, patching each other up and then reaming the injured party out for being reckless.

“Rogue…” Sting had finished, tying off the last of the bandages and moving to grip the Shadow Dragon-slayer by the shoulder, and Rogue took a deep breath. _Here we go._ Instead, Sting’s grip tightened to the point where he could miss how badly the other Dragon-slayer was trembling, and he had just opened his mouth, not sure what he was going to say when Sting lifted his head and met his gaze head-on. “We’re going to show them,” Sting said, voice barely above a whisper. “We’re going to be the strongest in the guild, together and then…” _No one will dare punish us._ It was left unspoken, but Rogue knew that was what he was thinking, after all, it was a wish that they had made a dozen times before, but never with this fire, this determination.

“I know.”

“No,” Sting shook his head. “I know we’ve said this before, that we’ve promised ourselves over and over that we’re going to get stronger.” His grip tightened, bordering on painful. “But I mean it. I’m not going to let him hurt you again.”

A vow.

A pledge.

There was anger in those words – aimed at Jiemma, at their guildmates who stood by, at himself for being unable to stop it and Rogue for speaking out – but there was also a certainty. A declaration, not a wish or a hope, and a fire in his eyes that Rogue hadn’t seen before, and at that moment, he believed that they would get that strong, that no one would be able to touch them. The promise binding them, the protectiveness shared, and the feeling of ‘more’ pressing closer than ever, and Rogue didn’t hesitate, didn’t think, as he leant forward and kissed Sting.

It wasn’t passionate in any sense, and perhaps more precious for it. A promise in a single press of the lips, a declaration of faith, of hope, of trust.

Of love.

“Together,” he whispered when they parted, both blushing, and even as Frosch and Lector broke in with worried words, and questions about what they had been doing and what they were planning on doing, they looked at each other and smiled.

_Together._

****

_Sting had always imagined that he would be the one flustered by public displays of affections, not that they had the chance to share many with the situation at Sabertooth. But on those rare occasions where they felt safe enough to risk it, usually when they were on a job, and far from the watchful eyes of their guildmates and Master, he soon learned that he was wrong. While he could feel his cheeks heating up at the slightest gesture, it was Rogue who grew flustered, turning bright pink and losing track of anything he had been trying to say. The best moments were the simplest, the moments when he would wrap his pinky around Rogue’s, easy enough to hide between them or under the table, or chaste kisses, innocent were it not for the depth of feeling beneath each one, and each one was cherished._

****

This was supposed to be it, their pinnacle of achievement, their moment of becoming strong enough that Jiemma, Minerva and the rest of Sabertooth would never be able to question their power or lay a finger on them again, and he had failed. He had Lector back in his arms, tears of relief rolling down his cheeks, and he had heard enough of the announcements to know that even though Rogue too had been defeated, he was okay. He still had everything that was most precious to him, and yet at that moment the taste of defeat was like ashes in his mouth, and as he sat and held Lector, frustration mingled with the relief, and he buried his face into the Exceed’s fur.

_How much stronger do we need to become? How much stronger do I need to be to keep him safe?_

The hand on his shoulder was unexpected, and he jolted, startled to find Rogue crouching down in front of him. The scent of his mate flooding his nose, grounding him, reminding him that he did still have that which was most precious to him, and yet… “I’m sorry…” He blurted as he met Rogue’s gaze, and the other Dragon-slayer blinked at him in confusion for a moment, before an increasingly rare smile spread across his face.

“Why?”

“Why?” Sting echoed, confused both by the smile and the question.

“Why are you apologising?” Rogue clarified. “Because we didn’t win? Because you couldn’t be the kind of man that Jiemma is?” He reached for Sting then, brushing away some of the tears that were still falling down Sting’s cheeks, before moving to cup his mate’s cheek, stopping Sting from looking away. “If you had gone through with it, would you feel any better than you do now?” He asked, and Sting blinked, opening his mouth to say that of course, he would have felt different because they would have won, they would have been the strongest and…

“No…” He couldn’t lie, not to Rogue and not to himself. He closed his eyes, seeing Fairy Tail stood in front of him, bruised and battered and on their last legs, yet somehow stronger for it. Radiant. He could have fought them, might even have defeated them, but would it have proved that he was stronger? “I…” He had stopped because he had realised that wasn’t the victory or the strength that would give him Lector back, that was the lofty ideal he and Rogue had promised themselves over and over. But, with Rogue’s words in his ears, he realised that his mate was right, that some part of him had flinched away from taking that step, seizing that kind of strength… from becoming the man, he had defeated to get this far. “But I promised we would win…” He whispered, looking at Rogue once more.

“And ‘we’ lost,” Rogue pointed out. “We,” he added, the ‘we’ softer and more intimate. “Promised that we were going to become stronger, and we have. Not winning isn’t a weakness, not this time…and look at us, we’re together, we’re free of Jiemma because of you. We’re….”

“Free to be you and me,” Sting finished for him, a slow smile beginning to spread across his face. It didn’t completely erase the sting of defeat, but it softened it and warmed him. _We’re free._ He hadn’t been able to feel that in the wake of Jiemma’s defeat, but now, sitting there with Rogue’s hand on his face, their Exceeds cuddling into them, and the eyes of the world focused on Fairy Tail, he could, and he took a deep breath and then another.

_Free…_

He reached out then, grabbing Rogue’s top and pulling him into a deep kiss, not caring that they were out in the open, or that the lacrimas were still in action, possibly projecting this moment to the world as he kissed his mate.

_Free, they were finally free to be them._

****

_Together. Rogue had always known that they were stronger together, even during their darkest moments, but in the wake of the Grand Magic Games, it almost became a mantra. He had seen what he had become, how strong his future-self had been, and he wanted no part of it because that Rogue hadn’t had Sting – whether through choice, or some other darkness, and that was a future he would fight against until his last breath. He had been the one to reach for Sting as they sat together, exhausted in the aftermath of the fight against the Dragons. Realising just how far they still had to climb even as they celebrated how far they’d come – emerging not victorious but together, having protected each other and their guildmates. Pulling his light close and holding him tight, kissing his mate as openly and fiercely as Sting had kissed him at the end of the Games._

_Together._


End file.
